It was only a matter of
time before this happened, I just knew this was going to spark a racial war and
rebuttals. The average Russian is racist, I am speaking from my encounter with
some of them that I have met, a former classmates experience living in Russia
for 3 months…I bet Dasha did not expect the backlash, because no right thinking
person would expect to get away with such prejudice if not that she believes it
is acceptable.

He told the Huffington
Post, “I was forced to leave Russia because of the discrimination I experienced
as a gay [man]. I’m disappointed that the tradition of xenophobia is so strong
in my home country that such an image of Ms. Zhukova can appear as if it is
normal and unremarkable. Russian people do not seem to realize when people
offend the principle of color, nationality, sexual orientation and so on.”

See the NSFW image below:

He went on to tell OutThere Magazine, “[I]t deeply saddens me to
see that racism is now being glamorized and thus made not only acceptable but
trendy by the likes of Ms. Zhukova. My own composition reverses the visual
injustice and offense perpetrated by that editorial and in a way restores the
equality of genders, races, and sexual orientations. Sadly, I understand very
well that my work will be seen by most Russians as provocative and
inappropriate, while that repulsive image (published on Martin Luther King’s
Day of all days in a year) will hardly make anyone over there shake their
head.”

Alexander’s image differs
from Zhukova’s significantly: the man in
the picture is not a mannequin but a human being, who voluntarily agreed to
pose for the photograph. Dasha is clothed, and the mannequin barely covered
while both men in Alexander’s photograph are both naked.